“Birmingham’s great strength is its diversity and we can be the city that gets it right and provides a model for the rest of country." - Gisela Stuart

Labour MPs have backed party leader Ed Miliband’s pledge to cut unskilled immigration - and ban immigrants from working in some public sector posts unless they speak English.

Mr Miliband is making the promise in a party political broadcast, where he admits the last Labour Government “got things wrong” on immigration.

The Labour leader says in the broadcast: “It’s not prejudiced when people worry about immigration; it’s understandable. And we were wrong in the past when we dismissed people’s concerns.”

His comments are a contrast with the attitude of former Labour Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who was overheard during the 2010 general election campaign calling a supporter a “bigoted woman” when she expressed concern about immigration from Eastern Europe.

Mr Miliband says: “Britain’s diversity is a source of our great strength. It makes us a more successful country. But people can lose out if migration isn’t properly managed. The pace of change can be too fast or people can see their wages undercut.”

Labour supported rules limiting the number of immigrants who could come to the UK from Eastern Europe, he says.

“Low-skill migration has been too high and we need to bring it down. That means the maximum transitional controls for new countries coming in from Eastern Europe; it means properly enforcing the minimum wage so people aren’t brought here to undercut workers already here; and it means let’s give proper training to workers already here so that they have a fighting chance of filling the vacancies that exist.”

And he adds: “We’ll make English language teaching a priority, and the priority it deserves to be. And we’d also have a very simple rule, which says that if you work in the public sector, in a job face to face with the public, you need to be able to speak English.”

Birmingham MP Gisela Stuart (Lab Edgbaston) said she welcomed the comments, adding: “Birmingham’s great strength is its diversity and we can be the city that gets it right and provides a model for the rest of country.

“My experience is that there is concern about immigration and people from all backgrounds and ethnicities can be worried about immigration policy.”